One of the hottest service concepts of recent years is coming to Oak Park on Feb. 1 — and to a corner of Oak Park that is happily unexpected: Lake Street just west of Austin Boulevard.
Oak Park Works, a shared work space with a spark of entrepreneurialism and the instincts of a concierge service, is opening in a double storefront that has been outfitted in casual work spaces and up-to-the-moment tech.
This is the shared vision of four Oak Parkers, all parents of young children, all looking for a place to work that isn’t a coffee shop or a back bedroom and that fosters a sense of community and a networking ethos that makes business both more fun and more likely to grow.
Here’s their “meet cute” story. All their kids attend Oak Park Montessori over on Garfield. After launching their kids into school each day these four would chat in the parking lot, talking about the ups and downs of remote work options. “We were spending money every day in coffee shops,” said Matthew Murray, a professional business writer. “It was like, let’s rent a space!”
So those casual chats turned into a compelling discussion. Why doesn’t Oak Park have a shared work space? What could they build that would be greater than a shared printer and a super-sized Keurig?
For Shiren Mathai, a chief technical officer in software development, the answer was creating a space of welcome with an emphasis on collaboration and the sort of problem-solving efforts that would make it feel like there was a concierge on duty.
“Co-working is a huge industry,” said Murray. “But we built this for the village. It is not the traditional model. We looked at a lot of places. But we feel strongly about Oak Park. We wanted a work place that was consistent with the values we see in Oak Park.”
Part of that plays out in the Lake Street location they finally chose. The owners are enthused about all that is happening in their immediate neighborhood — from the brewery coming to an old bank building at Lake and Austin, to the park district’s always-buzzing gymnastics center across the street, the Oak Park River Forest Museum opening at Lombard and Lake, School of Rock, and Pete’s Fresh Market. The Green Line stop is just a couple hundred feet away.
Murray, Mathai and I talked one December afternoon as the internet and Wi-Fi were being installed and construction continued on work tables and in the conference room in the second storefront. “This is a home-grown enterprise,” said Murray. “We all have day jobs.”
Mathai, though, said the owners will spend a lot of time on site and will use their existing personal networks to draw in clients and members. “There are a good number of Oak Parkers who work from home. But we are social beings. It is a lonely experience working from home. We need contact.”
Among the four partners they have nine children, age 2-10. So being close to home has many advantages. Along with Murray and Mathai, the other partners are Kelli Harsch, an attorney, and Kevin Cohen, an operations executive.
Oak Park Works opens on Feb. 1. You can find out more about their “collaborate locally” philosophy at OakParkWorks.com. You can sign on for the day but, by intention, the far better deal is a membership by the month. Collaboration is better with people you come to know, solving problems works better when the person at your elbow has won trust, and sparking creativity comes more readily when an owner shows you how to change the toner.
